topic Re: Best practice to mirror features in Fusion Design, Validate & Document Forum

Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Sat, 21 Oct 2023 12:32:01 GMT

Hi all,

i use fusion mainly for modeling furniture cabinets, or speaker cabinets. Often times i have to mirror features like extrudes for hinges, or holes etc.

The problem is, that it`s not possible to mirror a feature of one component to another.

to make it a bit easier to understand, i built an example cabinet:

every part is made out of a main sketch. As you can see i created the new components directly in the extrude feature. That's what seems to be best practice to me, as every panel should be an individual component for manufacturing in the end. However when i make holes in one panel it is not possible to simply mirror them to the other panel. And it has another hughe drawback, if you forget to choose "new part" while doing the extrusion, it's absolutley impossible to fix this mistake afterwards.. Of course i can create a new part out of this body extrusion, cut and paste it into the main component, but then the extrude feature is still connected to the component it was initially created in.

I wonder what the most professional way to solve those problems woould be..

To me there are two options:

- create new components out of the initial extrude

- If mirroring a feature is needes, go back in the timeline, create the hole pattern on the left panel and then mirror the left panel component as a new component to the right

As it seems simple and intuitive in this example, i figured out that the timeline is often very tricky in larger assemblys. Oftentimes it is just not possible to move features around, as they depend on other features. And it is nearly impossible to figure out what those dependencies are. To me it seems that the timeline is quite bugy in general..

And this absolutley crashes the top to bottom approuch which fusion is aiming on..

Option two:

Instead of creating new components, create bodies in a maincomponent. This brings all the advantages of top to bottom modelling including the ability to mirror features from one side to another.

When everthin is done, create a component for every single body.

I tend to use option two as it has many advantages in my opinion. But i'm curious on other solutions 🙂

In general, why is there no option to select a component where an extrude feature should be created? This is a huge drawback in my eyes..

OK.. I just found out, that the mirror feature is also not working from one body to another ?! I'm quite sure that this worked in the past.
I get an error which says it was not possible to calculate. I really need the mirror function, why is it not possible to select bodies which should be involved for this mirror feaure?

Re: Best practice to mirror features

g-andresen — Sat, 21 Oct 2023 12:58:47 GMT

Hi,

have a look at this thread > # 4

günther

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Sat, 21 Oct 2023 13:34:36 GMT

well thats not a good workaround, because it will only work when the two bodies are parallel..

I can't believe that there is no proper mirror feature in fusion like in inventor and any other CAD program..

Re: Best practice to mirror features

TrippyLighting — Sun, 22 Oct 2023 20:56:53 GMT

Can you share one of your models?

Re: Best practice to mirror features

MichaelT_123 — Mon, 23 Oct 2023 23:34:22 GMT

Hi Mr. D.Milich

Consider checking the attached file. Look at UserParams list.

Regards

MichaelT

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 07:21:35 GMT

Hi thanks for the answers.

I know that its possible to mirror bodies and components. But my goal was to just mirror a single feature to a another body..

i think i will program a feature which is at least able to mirror an extrude myself.

i really don't understand why this isn't possible in fusion as this is a typical top down approach. Mirroring a whole part is not a solution when you only want to mirror a single feature..

Dominik

Re: Best practice to mirror features

MichaelT_123 — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 11:28:35 GMT

Hi Mr. D.Milich

.... think about a feature as about a function with arguments f(x₁, x₂, ...),. It will generate result only when there is required sync between function mechanisms and supplied arguments types/values.

One can encapsulate f(.) in external function g(.), creating virtual operation g(f()) which also requires matching arguments in order to produce real results.

Different features ( f()s ) in F360 have various contextual arguments requirements. As I understand (and what is typical in mathematics I know) those arguments are inherited by encapsulating them features. In a simple example, mirror feature (g() function) encapsulates extrude feature ( f() function) taking along arguments or context of extrude (local coordinates, profiles, etc.). In the current construct there is no place to change/replace those arguments. Theoretically, it would be possible, but certainty in a messy process. Additionally, feature over feature ( g(f(x₁, x₂, ...)) can make the process invalid, breaking up the sync between functions mechanisms and applied context ( arguments (x₁, x₂, ...)). Look at the example of the modified attached file. The mirrored Extrude3 feature will generate an error when set to cut ... as there will not be body (from original context, let's say argument x₁=Body1,) to cut to ( extrude new body will produce a result).

I personally would not make things complex ... unless necessary!

Regards

MichaelT

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 18:39:41 GMT

ok i have a very nice example of not beeing able to manipulate the timeline. And the model is very small at this point..

the sketch is independent from the mirror feature but it is not possible to move it to the left. Its correct that i cannot move it to the right as the extrudes depend on the sketch. But why can i not move the sketche before the mirror ?? Whats funny i can drag the sketch far BEFORE the component it belongs to was created, at some point it suddenly snaps in:

Which should definetly not possible. But ones it is there it is not possible to move it back to the correct position..

If i grab all three features than i can drag it before the mirror feature

but how should somebody figure this behavior out in a large assembly ?? Or is it just my fusion which has this bugy behaviour?

Re: Best practice to mirror features

TrippyLighting — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 19:04:01 GMT

I had no problems moving the mirror feature to the left before the component-mirror feature.

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 19:15:01 GMT

Yes i can also move the mirror feature, but why is the sketch stuck ?

i tried to move the sketch to the left of the mirror and then one or both extrude features

Re: Best practice to mirror features

TrippyLighting — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 19:56:46 GMT

Is this what you are trying to achieve ?

Edit: Re-recorded the correct screen 😉

(view in My Videos)

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 19:53:15 GMT

Hi,

you recorded the wrong screen 🙂

I'm just wondering why it is not possible to move the sketch before the mirror feature. I cannot see any dependencies.. and I can move the mirror feature after the sketch which proves that there is not dependency.

I find this behavior of the timeline very problematic, as it gets worse the bigger the timeline gets..

Re: Best practice to mirror features

laughingcreek — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 20:05:27 GMT

@FedX33 wrote:

... but why is the sketch stuck ?...

this sketch?

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 20:20:06 GMT

Yes! Why is it possible for you? I downloaded the model again and opened it. No chance I cannot move the sketch..

But that confirms that there's something wrong with my timeline.. I use Win11

i can only move the sketch when i grab both extrudes.. But it is possible to move the extrudes to before the sketch what should not be possible

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 20:38:28 GMT

i can move it to the very begining without getting an error in my model:

this is definetley a bug. I even reinstalled Fusion and deleted all roaming and app data ..

at some point on the left it suddenly snaps, but then its impossible to get it back

OK i figured out the issue.. Everything works just fine when the data panel on the left is closed. As soon as it is open this leads to those timeline bugs i discovered. It seems there is a bug in the drag functionality when the window is opened. I use a ultrawide screen with 3440x1440 maybe its the format

Re: Best practice to mirror features

laughingcreek — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 21:23:58 GMT

I just tried with the data panel open and it also didn't work for me. I usually have my data panel closed for the real-estate, and definitely when doing a screen cast, so I never noticed that it made a difference. @jeff_strater - can you have a look at this bug?

Re: Best practice to mirror features

jeff_strater — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 22:38:39 GMT

I'm looking at it. I think it is a bug. I can move the sketch before the mirror OK, but not anywhere else, unless the data panel is open, then I can drag it to some random locations that I don't understand:

(view in My Videos)

[edit] I created bug FUS-141866 for this issue. I'm not sure if this is data-specific or a more general problem. Thanks for sharing the design with us

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Wed, 25 Oct 2023 08:26:40 GMT

perfect, i've gone crazy with that timeline and really though i'm to dumb to use it correctly 😄

Re: Best practice to mirror features

FedX33 — Thu, 26 Oct 2023 11:36:30 GMT

Hi Jeff,

please add a additional thing to the bug report:

Fusion window hat to be opened on main monitor that the timeline works correctly. As soon as i switch the fusion window to another monitor i have the same issue like when the model panel is opened..

and the window needs to be in fullscreen mode, maybe that's the root cause for issues